China May 2016

Kandi K17 Cyclone: Future Best Seller?

BYD Qin is Back

The Chinese market had more than 26.000 EV's new EV's zooming the streets last month, a 119% increase over the same month last year, in-line with the annual growth rate, with the EV market share around 0.9%.

We will see now see May’s Top 5 Best Selling models individual performance:

#1 - BYD Tang: The 500 hp Chinese Cayenne continues to rule the EV market, with 3.249 units, the SUV being the best-selling model for the fifth sixth consecutive time, but somehow we get the feeling that it could reach even higher sales levels if BYD wasn't production constrained...

#2 - BYD Qin: The most common plug-in in China, with over 50.000 units registered, the Qin has received recently a 100% electric version (207 units last month), but the model bread and butter is the 300 hp PHEV version, with 2.705 units. This sort-of BYD Corolla is experiencing a resurgence as of lately, growing for the fourth time in a row, will it reach its all-time record (4.030 units, July ’15) soon?

#3 - Kandi Panda EV: One of the best-selling models of 2015, the city car has adapted to the new incentives rules and returned in April, with last month being already the Best Selling all-electric model and Third in the plug-in ranking, with 2.598 units, at this point Kandi seems to be the only automaker able to reach similar sales levels of BYD best-selling models. 

#4 - SAIC Roewe e550: Shangai-based SAIC has the expectation to replicate BYD Qin success with this one, the recently re-named e550, the plug-in hybrid version of its 550 ICE Best Seller. For the moment, it has no reason to complain, as it has beaten its monthly sales record last month, with 2.198 units, so it seems we will see it here frequently.

#5 - BAIC E-Series EV: Sales of BAIC's B-Class electric hatch are a mish-mash of good and bad results: If on the one hand, YTD sales are up 102% YoY, on the other hand, comparing last month sales with that of May ‘15, numbers are up only 14%. Production constraints? I suspect it is so, now that the Beijing-based automaker is turning its attention to the larger (And more profitable) EU260 sedan.

Year-to -Date Ranking

If the podium positions have remained unchanged, we now have a new customer in the Fourth Position, with the BYD Qin retuning to its old form (2.912 units, best result since last August) and displacing the JAC I EV 4/5 to Fifth, while another model has made a thunderous comeback: The Kandi Panda EV jumped to #9, with a fourth BYD rounding up the Top 10, the e5 sedan rose to #10, thanks to a record performance of 1.172 units.

Outside the Top 10, we can see the Changan Eado EV (721 units) jump to #13, while on the other hand, the Tesla Model S dropped to #15, it looks like a rather discrete positioning for the imported car, until you realize that 96% of the Chinese EV Market belongs to domestic automakers, and of the remaining 4%, half of that belongs to Tesla, with the Second best-selling foreign automaker model being the locally-made Volvo S60L PHEV, in #25, with 394 units.

In #19 we see the return of the Zhidou EV, a tiny city-car that, like the Kandi model, has adapted to the new incentive rules (More range and power required) and is back at the market.

Looking at the manufacturers ranking, BYD is a firm leader (37%, down 3%), followed in Second Place by BAIC (12%, down 1%) and JAC (9%, down 2%) in Third.

Pl	China	May	YTD	%
1	BYD Tang	3.249	15.615	18
2	BAIC E-Series EV	1.714	8.712	10
3	BYD e6	1.683	7.579	8
4	BYD Qin *	2.912	7.334	8
5 6 7 8	JAC I EV 4/5 SAIC Roewe e550 JMC E100 Chery eQ	1.076 2.198 1.300 1.269	6.513 6.382 4.527 4.384	7 7 5 5
9	Kandi K11 Panda EV	2.598	3.127	4
10	BYD e5	1.172	2.676	3
11	Geely Dorsett EV	1.000	2.461	3
12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20	Zotye Cloud EV Changan Eado EV JAC i EV6S Tesla Model S e) Zotye E200 BAIC EU260 GAC Trumpchi GA5 R. Zhidou EV Venucia Morning Wind	406 721 554 300 853 769 570 1.071 274	2.301 2.163 1.858 1.811 1.602 1.561 1.399 1.071 1.052	3 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 1
	TOTAL	26.578	89.210	100

* - 2.705 PHEV + 207 BEV

e) Estimate

Post also published on EV Obsession and CleanTechnica.